The Afternoon Adventure (Part 1)

After a slow morning of reading and lounging, I jumped out of the bed, disgusted with my own laziness, determined to do something exciting and not waste the entire day. I decided to go hiking and called a friend of mine to meet me for a spontaneous hike.

Of course I took Kodie with me and this was a great opportunity for Elizabeth to bring her dog on his first hike. We set out in the late afternoon and that's when the day got interesting.

Shortly after setting out, Elizabeth fell really hard. When I heard her go down behind me I turned immediately and asked if she was ok. She replied with an emphatic NO! Her dog was by her head and all I could see was an oddly shaped arm under her body. I thought for sure she must have broken it.

I took her dog and gave her a minute to collect herself. As she raised up we could see immediately that her glasses were very bent and her face was cut. Thankfully, I was wrong and her arm was just fine. The outer part of her eye was bruised, bleeding, and quickly swelling. I got out my handy-dandy hiking first aid kit and was at least able to provide her with an antiseptic wipe.

We just sat on the ground for a while until she collected herself and stopped the bleeding. She was determined to hike considering it was her dog's first outing. So we set out, at a slow pace of course, for the trail. Thankfully we had planned to do a couple short distance trails so this one was only .75 mile.

We continued slowly but surely taking a couple of breaks because the uphill raised her blood pressure and I'm sure made her head pound.

After a short bit I noticed Kodie doing a strange little dance in front of me. Then I saw a bee go under her pack. I quickly tried to calm her and get the bee out. When I raised her pack there were at least four or five bees under it!!! I couldn't believe it.

I tried to think quick and safe, obviously I was not going to put my bare hand under her pack, so I grabbed a stick to shoo the bees out. As I was doing this, I heard Elizabeth behind me making a commotion and realized there were bees on her too! And her dog! When I stood up to survey the situation, the bees were all over me too!

I ran forward a bit and I think Elizabeth tried to as well but her dog got stung on the foot and wasn’t walking well. Sheesh. We moved up trail a bit and as she tended to him I got swarmed again. The bees were all over Kodie’s face and she was snapping at them, totally against my warnings. I took off and yelled to Elizabeth that I’d wait up ahead.

After a few minutes she met up with me and we very cautiously continued our hike. At times she carried her dog because of his sore foot.

It was a wild day in the woods, that’s for sure. After we completed that trail, I decided to hike for a bit longer since I’d made the drive. I took another ½ mile trail and almost slipped on a rock. For whatever it’s worth, Kodie enjoyed a dip in the creek.

I think there was something to that lazy day feeling I had in the morning. Maybe it would have been safer to just stay in bed.

But…if I’d have done that then I wouldn’t have taken a stroll through the prairie trail. (to be continued)